by Katharine Hansen, Ph.D.

The determination to find a new job for the new year is a resolution surpassed perhaps only by the resolve to lose weight. If you're thinking about making a change in 2001, you might like to know which job fields are seeing the most exciting growth and promise. The experts all have their opinions, which we've listed in a table below. Perhaps even more instructive is a look at some of the trends and conditions that will affect job growth and regression in the coming year.

Among the factors that will influence job growth in 2001 are a new administration in Washington, the aging population, the Internet, the trend toward cocooning and increased leisure time, energy shortages and high energy prices, an increasingly diverse population, mergers and acquisitions, stock-market fluctuations, and rapidly advancing technology.

Some trends exert obvious influences. Thousands of Clinton administration appointees will be looking for new jobs as thousands of Bush administration wannabes clamor to replace them. The aging population means greater demands on the healthcare, pharmaceutical, and leisure industries. It also means openings for college graduates in most sectors because of retiring Baby Boomers.

Of the 20 fastest-growing occupations for those who hold at least a bachelor's degree, more than half are health-related or in the computer industry, reports Occupational Outlook Quarterly.

Despite the media-headlined crash of the dot-coms, the Internet remains a major player in job growth because it has changed the way people do things. More online shopping, for example, means more jobs in package-delivery services. With more and more young people online, the Internet also is seen as a key venue for reaching the coveted youth market. And dot-coms are far from dead; job-seekers just need to be more discriminating. The would-be dot-commer must ask tough questions about the solvency of prospective e-commerce employers and be wary of compensation in the form of stock options that could plummet in value.

Those who seek work in e-commerce would be wise to seek out hot sectors, such as the wireless and fiber-optics industries, writes Dori Jones Yang in U.S. News & World Report. Wireless services, in fact, is one of the world's hottest sectors, according to Employment Review Online. Yang also notes that the business-to-business sector is hotter than the business-to-consumer area.

Dot-coms aside, the overall high-tech segment is still growing with great demand for jobs, including software programmers, database managers, quality assurance managers, graphic artists, Web designers, and related non-technical positions, such as copy editors and market researchers, reports Employment Review Online. Job opportunities with Internet service providers also will remain strong, the publication predicts, with positions such as network engineers, systems engineers, and applications engineers leading the way.

Another hot technology area is nanotechnology, also known as miniaturization. The bottom line in technology, say Kara Kitts and Sherri Pfeil in Employment Review Online, is that "the individuals who stay current on what's new and can update their skills accordingly will have the best shot at landing jobs.'

The tech world also has spawned a trend toward free-agency and consulting, note Anne Kates Smith et al in U.S. News. Free-agent techies often are able to name their own terms.

And, the tech world aside, labor shortages plague such areas as retail, nursing, and teaching, report Kitts and Pfeil. Occupations that have a large number of openings and are also expected to grow rapidly include systems analysts, social workers, secondary-school teachers, college and university faculty, physicians, and registered nurses, according to Occupational Outlook Quarterly.

Rapidly growing jobs in the management field include management analysts, medical and health-services managers, advertising and public relations managers, computer and information systems managers, and loan counselors/officers, reports Occupational Outlook Quarterly, which also predicts demand in marketing and sales.

See also our related article, Top Jobs for Y2K and Beyond.

As we enter 2001, it's almost impossible not to hear the strains of Also Sprach Zarathustra and mentally see the accompanying images from Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. Although reality may be somewhat different from what Kubrick and author Arthur C. Clarke envisioned, the new year will surely bring an interesting odyssey to the world of job-seeking.

Hot Job Fields as Predicted by the Experts

Click on the links to the experts for more information about these jobs.

U.S. News  & World Report	Experience.com (Experience Magazine print version)	Top 100 Fastest Growing Careers for the 21st Century*	Employment Review Online
Plant Geneticist	Workplace Strategy Consultant	Database Administrator	Jobs in Telecommunications
Hispanic Marketing Specialist	Technology/Intellectual Property Rights Attorney	Software Engineer	Business-to-Business E-Commerce Consultant
Supermarket Chef	Jobs in Personal Services	Home Care Aide	IT Professional for the Computer-Chip Sector
Robotics Engineer	Jobs in Venture Philanthropy	Physical Therapy Aide	Nurse
Quantitative Analyst	Jobs in the Wireless Industry	Medical Assistant	Jobs in the Pharmaceutical Industry
Chief Experience Officer		Desktop Publishing Specialist	Healthcare Technologist
Enterprise Application Integration Evangelist		Physical Therapist	Physical Therapist
Executive Coach		Occupational Therapy Aide	Speech Pathologist
Chief Privacy Officer		Paralegal	Temporary Worker
Nanotechnologist		Occupational Therapist	Occupational Therapists
Virtual-reality architect			Staffing Services Salesperson
Steel House Framer
Educational Consultant
High-Tech Clothing Designer
Talent Wizard
Law Practice Technologist
Web Doctor
Internet Political Strategist
Youth Soccer Coach
Adventure Travel Guru

Occupational Outlook Quarterly**	JobTrak***
Database Administrator	Jobs in Education
Computer Systems Analyst	Jobs in Engineering
Computer Engineer	Jobs in the Nonprofit Sector
Information Systems Manager
Physician Assistant
Residential Counselor
Financial Services Advisor
Speech Pathologist
Social Worker
Biological Scientist
Occupational Therapist
Physical Therapist
Special Ed Teacher
Health Services Manager
Computer Programmer
Management Analyst
Interior Designer
Other Designer
Preschool Teacher
Electrical Engineer

*From the book, The Top 100: The Fastest Growing Careers for the 21st Century, Ferguson Publishing, Chicago, IL.
** Fastest-growing jobs requiring a bachelor's degree or more education.
***Based on trends in hiring college graduates, October 2000. Only those categories that showed gains over October 1999 are listed.

Questions about some of the terminology used in this article? Get more information (definitions and links) on key college, career, and job-search terms by going to our Job-Seeker's Glossary of Job-Hunting Terms.

Katharine Hansen, Ph.D., creative director and associate publisher of Quintessential Careers, is an educator, author, and blogger who provides content for Quintessential Careers, edits QuintZine, an electronic newsletter for jobseekers, and blogs about storytelling in the job search at A Storied Career. Katharine, who earned her PhD in organizational behavior from Union Institute & University, Cincinnati, OH, is author of Dynamic Cover Letters for New Graduates and A Foot in the Door: Networking Your Way into the Hidden Job Market (both published by Ten Speed Press), as well as Top Notch Executive Resumes (Career Press); and with Randall S. Hansen, Ph.D., Dynamic Cover Letters, Write Your Way to a Higher GPA (Ten Speed), and The Complete Idiot's Guide to Study Skills (Alpha). Visit her personal Website or reach her by e-mail at kathy(at)quintcareers.com.